Long term storage & retrieval of data

[MSIC]

Been thinking about the newly termed "Web 2.0" which i think i am getting my head around, and (correct me if ai am wrong) it involves the use of applications as well as data storage on machines via the internet, using your own PC as a terminal.

Thinking also back to the (near) fiasco when the BBC tried to archive the Doomsday Book back in the 1980's on laserdisc, and then in the late 90's couldnt find a laserdisc player to retrieve said data back again.....

Is web-based data possibly the only sure-fire way of storing data for the longer term?
Specifically I am thinking about photographs and information about my family tree and wanting information i collect to be available for my grandchildren in 100 years time, and can't imagine that ony optical discs will be 1) still not degraded and 2) able to be read on some type of super-holographic electron reader machine.

Anyone have any opinions please?

[Funkstar]

it's not just the media that you need to read, but also the format the data is in needs to be read into software somehow.

Personally i don't think there is any one sure fire way to deal with this. What i would be doing is taking the data and moving it onto new media every couple of years, and when there is a completely new media type (CD to DVD, DVD to HD-DVD/BluRay) i'd move to that to remain compatible in years to come. Of course there is no harm in keeping the older copies just in case. I wouldn't be surprised if DVD-R or CD-R out lasts HD-DVD/BluRay as a recording format.

Hard drives are good for pretty long term storage. I could still quite happily connect a 10MB drive to my laptop (using USB or SATA converters) and get the data off it today. Can't say the same for 5 1/4" floppy disks or 3.5" floppy disks even.

[chicken]

Hammer + Chisel + Rock = Longest Storage

But seriously though, the more simple you make it the better chance you have of recovering the data later. Hard Drives are good, and Optical Discs if you keep them in a dark and safe place, but Funkstar has a good point with the software, what use is a working disc when your files are in Word 2000 format and it's 2100?

I'd say use file formats like CSV or XML wherever possible, that way you can easily reconstruct the data at the other end and retain some structure.